"Off the Shelf" Book Group
January - June 2026

Our book group meets at 7:00 p.m. the first Tuesday of the month downstairs in the Library's meeting room. Copies of discussion books will be available at the front desk one month before the group meets. This year, we are celebrating America @ 250.

Walden by Henry David Thoreau (Classic Fiction - Summer Reading Selection)
Tuesday, July 7
In 1845 Thoreau built a shanty in the woods by Walden Pond, where he lived from 1845-1847. Walden is a treatise on the subjects of self-sufficiency, individualism, relationship with nature, and rejection of material ambition.

The Core of an Onion by Mark Kurlansky (Nonfiction - Summer Reading Selection)
Tuesday, August 4
Flourishing in just about every climate and culture around the world, onions have provided the essential basis not only for sautes, stews, and sauces, but for medicines, metaphors, and folklore. Now they're Mark Kurlansky's most flavorful infatuation yet as he sets out to explore how and why the crop reigns from Italy to India and everywhere in between.


The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer (Nonfiction - Summer Reading Companion)
Tuesday, September 1
Discussion Held at the Barber Shoppe
The #1 New York Times bestselling author of "Braiding Sweetgrass" explains how to orient our lives around gratitude, reciprocity and community, based on the lessons of the natural world.

After Annie by Anna Quindlen (Current Fiction)
Tuesday, October 6
When Annie Brown dies suddenly, her husband, her children, and her closest friend are left to find a way forward without the woman who has been the lynchpin of all their lives. Over the course of the next year what saves them all is Annie, ever-present in their minds. The power she has given to those who loved her is the power to go on without her.

The Time Machine by H.G. Wells (Classic Fiction)
Tuesday, November 3
Discussion Held at the Barber Shoppe
A classic novel of the future follows the Time Traveler as he hurtles one million years into the future and encounters a world populated by two distinct races, the childlike Eloi and the disgusting Morlocks who prey on the Eloi.

The Book Club Hotel by Sarah Morgan (Current Fiction - Holiday Read)
Tuesday, December 1
While dealing with her fully booked inn for the holidays, widow and single mom Hattie Coleman just wants to make it through the festive season and is not prepared when her own story becomes entwined in those of three lifelong friends, changing all their lives during the most enchanting time of the year.